The Utility of Force

The Utility of Force

370 August..l, 1984 THE UTILITY OF FORCE There is such a thing
as seeing another come to grief yes even to destruction, without
being one whit wiser your self, because you do not understand how
it happened and you do not understand, either because you do not
see the principle he has violated, or because you miss the
application of it in his case, and consequently to your own. 1
INTRODUCTION The performance of the U.S. military since the end of
World War I1 has led some to question the ability of the services
to defeat an enemy in the event of war. Critics have claimed that
the Pentagon cannot devise successful military policies; Korea
Vietnam, the aborted I ranian hostage rescue mission, and the
Beirut tragedy are cited as examples of U.S. postwar military
malaise. Even the recent Grenada operation has come in for its
share of criticism.

One consequence of such failures has been the emergence of a
military re form" movement, a loose alliance of defense analysts
members of Congress, congressional staff, journalists, and some
Alfred Thayer Mahan, Naval Strategy ciples of Military Operations
on Land (Boston, Massachusetts: Little Brown and Company, 1911 p.
11.

The New Republic, May 7, 1984; Jeffrey Record It's Full of
Bureaucrats Instead of Warriors Washington Post, January 29, 1984;
Report on Grenada to Congressional Military Reform Caucus by Bill
Lind on April 5, 1984 reprinted in press release of Representative
Jim Courter (R-NJ Compared and Contrasted with the Prin2 military
officers. These "reformers" are generally critical of established
policy in a number of areas, including strategy t actics doctrine,
force structures, weapons acquisition, and defense organization The
reform movement is hardly monolithic. Reformers them selves
disagree on many fundamental issues. Indeed it is likely that, in
some cases, military reform has become a smo k escreen for reducing
the defense budget. Claiming cutting Iffat" in defense spending as
their goal, some who don the mantle of military reform simply
oppose funding the nation's long overdue rearma ment. But it is
clear that these so-called reformers are having an impact that
cannot be ignored, particularly in the areas of defense
organization and weapons procurement.

Despite its lack of uniformity on the issues, the military
reform movement is characterized by certain common positions on
defense. The refo rmers' central concern is the I'American Way of
War,"'which they say emphasizes massive firepower designed to cause
the attrition of the enemy, and which aims at favorable exchange
ratiosll in terms of casualties at the expense of flexi- bility and
adapta bility to rapidly changing circumstances.

This approach the reformers argue, has led to the increasing
centralization and bureaucratization of the military; the replace
military manager; an increasing reiiance ons technologically
sophisticated weapons, whi ch are extraordinarily expensive and
often beyond the ability of the average soldier to operate; an
emphasis on individual rotation rather than unit rotation, with a
concomitant loss of combat effectiveness and a decline in morale
and a system driven by t h e convenience of the military management
system to the detriment of the military's nominal function rgent of
the bold and imaginativk military leader with the cautious i I The
reformers would replace the firepower/attrition style of warfare
with "maneuver warfare." They question'the Air Force's self-image
as an independent arm capable of decisive action on its own. They
attack the alleged preference within the services for high
technology state-of-the-art weapons, which for budgetary reasons
can never be p r ocured in the necessary quantities, and would
prefer cheaper weapons to gold-plated ones. And they would reform
the procurement process for weapons, which they claim currently
,produces improperly tested, ineffective weapons that cost too much
If taken in isolation, much of what the reformers claim is correct,
but the fact is that they have not addressed the root causes of
U.S. military problems. No amount of emphasis on organizational
reform or on new approachs to tactics and opera tions, no
reevaluation o f the methods of procuring weapons, no strengthening
of the system of officer education get to the root of the problem.
Until the fundamental issues are addressed there will be no such
thing as true military reform 3 One of the most important issues to
be raised concerns the utility of military force. Most of the
issues that the reformers call attention to have their origins not
in structural problems organization, tactics, or even strategy, but
in how Americans think about war and force. This has to do wi t h
national traditions and how Americans see themselves in the world.
Until reformers understand the philosophical roots of the defense
establishment and recognize that policy, weapons, and organization
derive from these roots, their recommendations will b e for naught.
For better or worse, the U.S. defense establishment reflects a
national consensus on the use of force in a nuclear world.

THE PROBLEM: TREATING SYMPTOMS INSTEAD OF CAUSES Much of what
the military reformers say has merit. But unfortunately ev en a
complete overhaul of the military establish ment and implementation
of the reformers' programs would not have the desired effect: to
improve the prospects of U.S. military success. The reason is
simple. Those very defects in the mili tary that the re f ormers
attack are the result of a way of thinking about war and military
force that is closely linked with the character of the U.S.
government itself, particularly as defined in the years since the
end of world War 11. The reformers have nothing to say a b out this
wayqof thinking, indeed most fervently share the assumptions that
arise from it. But until this defective ufiderstanding of the use
of military force and war is addressed, there is no hope for'.true
military reform. And there is danger that, by f ocusing exclusively
on tactics, operations, doctrine organization, and defense
procurement, the reformers will divert attention away from the
fundamental issue, to the detriment of national security.

The American Way of War is the consequence of the Americ an
character, which in turn derives from the tradition of Western
liberalism. Western liberalism is an ambiguous tradition. On the
one hand, the founders of the liberal tradition recognized the
necessity of war in defense of liberal principles. On the oth er
hand, liberal political philosophy argues that man is perfectible,
and that war, along with other types of human misery was the
avoidable consequence of socia1,organization.

Until recently, there has been no more optimistic a people They
have tended to believe that war is an than the Americans
aberration, foreign to the human condition, called forth by
unreasonable, ancient hatreds, poverty, or in rare cases, a totally
evil r egime. Unreasonable hatreds can be overcome by negotiation,
Americans believe, and poverty, by economic aid.

Only when.al1 else fails is war necessary, and then all the
stops are pulled out As General Daniel Graham comments, when p
eople are so blind or ev il as to wholly disregard their own
interests, Americans have decided these aber rations must be
utterly destroyed This facet of the 4 American character made
possible episodes such as Sherman's march to the sea, the bombing
of Dresden and Hiroshima has s o metimes been so strong that the
American people have believed that if only one particular evil were
wiped off the earth, mankind would thereafter live in endless
tranquil it The messianic streak in American history Though the
view that war is caused by po v erty or ignorance may appear to
share little with the view that it is caused by llevil,ll there is
a remarkable consistency between them. Both see war as contrary to
the natural condition of human beings. Inter national problems can
all be finally solved, through reasoning or altruism in the one
case, or through overpowering force on the other.

Indeed it should be noted that, in an important respect
political liberalism itself leads to the American Way of War.

The firepower/attrition style of war is the l ogical consequence
of liberal political science. In order to save lives and treasure
and to preserve the material basis of society, the liberal approach
to war calls for marshalling all the resources of the state during
the time of crisis in which those r e sources are required By
bringinu this massive power to bear, the war can be terminated
quickly, and subsequently the citizens can return to the natural
state of affairs: peace U.S. nuclear policy today is the result of
a conscious decision that recognizes the character of the American
regime It is a frequent target of military reform criticism, but it
will not be abandoned without a change in that character. The
paradox is that the U.S. has come to depend on nuclear weapons
because it is not a nation of so l diers b c In two important
respects nuclear weapons are quintessentially American. First, the
nuclear device is the ultimate firepower attrition weapon, the
purpose of which is to reduce American casualties. Second, nuclear
weapons were seen by the postwa r generation of policy makers as a
way of ensuring peace at a reduced cost. Nuclear weapons, after
all, provide Ilmore bang for the buck" than conventional forces
with.their emphasis on manpower.

What is more, nuclear weapons have made the modern welfare state
possible because expenditures for defense could be reduced and
those resources transferred to the nondefense public sector.

At the same time, the destructiveness of nuclear weapons seemed
to change things altogether. War became obsolete, though at the
cost of a threat of world annihilation. All parties Daniel

0. Graham, Shall America Be Defended New Rochelle, New York
Arlington House, 1979 pp. 18-19. 5 could see, went the argument,
that war or force had ceasedto be an instrument of policy. Thus
opti mism could be restored out of a desperate situation based on a
terrible weapon. Because of the ttbomb,tl rational statesmen were
now in a position to argue that diplomacy alone could solve
international disagreements and military force, insofar as it had a
ny use at all, was to be only an adjunct to diplomacy, to be used
incrementally to apply pressure or to signal intentions so that the
rational actors on the other side would be persuaded that the costs
of their continued policy outweighed the likely benef its. This
economic model of human behavior, arising in the wake of nuclear
weapons, was the genesis of the academic theory of "limited wartt
and all its offshoots.

The theory of limited war reinforces the traditional liberal
optimism that characterizes muc h of U.S. history. For Americans it
is inconceivable that two parties might have mutually irrecon
cilable purposes. It is inconceivable that negotiations might be
useless because there is nothing to negotiate. It is inconceivable
in the nuclear age that m ilitary force might, under some circum
stances, take precedence over diplomacy.

THE CONSEQUENCE: THE ACADEMIC THEORY OF LIMITED WAR The great
danger in believing that war is an aberration and that there is a
discontinuity betw.een war and peace is that a c ountry fails to
develop a comprehensive approach to -survivihg in a hostile world
It fails to devel.op an understanding of strategy.

Without a strategic basis, foreign policy is.a hollow shell. The
belief that war is an aberration was reinforced in the ye ars after
World War I1 by the view that nuclear weapons'had changed
fundamentally the nature and conduct of war, and that therefore all
past history was irrelevant. This in turn led to the triumph during
the 1950s and 1960s, of the social sciences as to t h e rationale
of national defense It was manifested in a new doctrine the
academic theory of limited war." According to this doctrine
military forces were to be used not to fight, but to llsignalit
certain attitudes, such as resolve and commitment, to the e nemy in
an effort to achieve not victory but a Itnegotiated
settlement."

The triumph of social science called into question the
traditional rationale for war, as taught by military history and
science, which reasoned that tactics were the art of fire and m
aneuver directed toward the goal of achieving victory on the
battlefield by massing superior forces at the decisive point in
time and space. In turn, tactical success was translated through
strategy into meaningful political achievements culminating in a
return to peace.

But the IInewI' way of war argued that deterrence, not the
employment of force to achieve. IWictory, It is the primary
function of the military. According to this view, any war can
escalate into nuclear war. While no sane government in the U.S
USSR, or any other country would intentionally initiate a nuclear
war, the possibility exists that nuclear war could begin
accidentally, due 6 to a breakdown in communications between
adversaries in which one or both nations misread the other's inten
t ions. Constant negotia tions aimed at maintaining a delicate
balance of terror must be conducted in order to avoid escalation.
Limited military force is permitted only for the purpose of
signalling intentions, which will keep up the pressure for
negotiati ons. Traditional military goals such as ltvictorytt are
ttdestabilizingtt and must be avoided.

U.S. failure in Vietnam, for example, can be understood as the
logical outcome of policies based on the assumptions of limited
war. Consider the affect of the U. S. conduct of the war on the
military profession and the civilian population. The academic
theory of limited war is an economic theory, and led to the use of
economic models as the guide to action. In the economic view, the
main use of military force was t o escalate the means incrementally
in order to incrementally inflict pain, so that the North Vietna
mese would be willing to negotiate. Military victory, even as
defined as merely the maintenance of the status quo ante, as in the
case of Korea, could not b e pursued because of the possibility
that the balance of power would be upset. Certainly it was not
acceptable to pursue those measures that victory in this limited
sense would have required, such as sustained interdiction of enemy
supply lines in Laos an d Cambodia or consolidation of ter ritorial
gains of success was required. In keeping with the economic models
of warfare that guided U.S. conduct of the war, such a measure had
to be subject to quantification. This led to the emergence of the
Ifbody count ' l as the legitimate measure of success on the battle
field through the employment of fire and maneuver, directed toward
massing forces in such a way as to break the enemy's will and
ability to continue to fight. No longer was tactical success
through stra t egy, directed toward the attainment of political
goals. Military science in Vietnam came to mean nothing more than
to kill as many of the enemy as possible, and the military
profession, through this debasement of its purpose, suffered a
severe crisis in m o rale, self-esteem, and military effectiveness
Since victory was not .an acceptable goal, an alternate measure At
the same time, the limited war theorists maintained that to avoid
escalating the material means to the level of nuclear war, it was
necessary to avoid escalating the moral means as well.

This meant that the national will was not to be mobilized and
that public passions were not to be stirred up.

Secretary Robert McNamara approvingly observed As Defense The
greatest contribution Vietnam is making--right or wrong is beside
the point--is that it is developing an ability in the United States
to fight a limited war, to go to war without the necessity o f
arousing the public ire Quoted in D. H. Rosenberg "Arms and the
American Way: The Ideological Dimension of'Military Growth in
Military Force and American Society Bruce M. Russett and Alfred
Stephan, eds. (New York: Harper and Row 1973), p. 170. 7 But na t
ional will, observed Clausewitz, is a most important component of
war It is the moral element. When we speak of destroying the
enemy's forces, we must emphasize that nothing obliges us to limit
this idea to physical forces. The moral element must also be c
on~idered The incremental escalation of the war, and the
determination to fight the war without mobilizing the national
will, both favored by the limited war theorists, signal the failure
of those theorists to come to grips with human nature war, includin
g limited war, than items that can be measured quantified, and
computerized There is more to The limited war theorists, instead of
taking human nature as they found it, argued backwards from what
they took to be the overriding issue of the day, the require ment
to avoid the possibi lity of an uncontrolled escalation of any
conflict into nuclear war be predicted in a technical, economic
way. A little more force here, and the enemy would see that future
resistance was too costly to continue.

A little more force there, and the American people would not
perceive the slight increment in costliness, and therefore not
object to the continuation of U.S. policy in Vietnam.

But homo economicus is not the whole man. The limite'd war
theorists overlooked what the Greeks called' thumos or
llspiritednesslf on As a result they postulated human beings whose
behavior can both the American'and communist side 0 m a The
griduated employment of force in an attempt'to kill enough of the
enemy to convince them that the cost was no t worth continuing
their aggression did not have the effect expected by those who held
an economic view of human nature. Instead thumos drove the North
Vietnamese to make incredible sacrifices beyond all reasonable
calculations of utility. On the U.S. side , the thumos that was not
permitted in support of the war, either at home or on the
battlefield, erupted instead in the form of protest against the
war, once U.S. casualties began to mount. The thumetic outbreak
against the war had not been anticipated by s uch theorists of
limited war as Robert E. Osgood who concluded that even if the
American people were hostile, because of their national traditions
and ideology (to a strategy of limited war), that strategy still
should be adopted.6 THE PERVASIVENESS OF LI M ITED WAR THINKING In
the journals read by political scientists and others in the social
sciences, war is depicted as part of a general "strategy of
conflictll or "game theory," in which the mechanism of graduated
Karl von Clausewitz, On War (Princeton, Ne w Jersey: Princeton
University Press, 1976 p. 97.

For an excellent discussion of the effect of economic thinking
upon the military profession and the consequences for the conduct
of the Vietnam War, see Wendell John Coates, "The Ideology of Arms
Control," Journal of Contemporary Studies, Summer 1982.a military
response is seen to be the means to a negotiated settle ment.7 For
instance, Kenneth Waltz writes about a Ilstrategyll for limited war
in the Persian Gulf area using the same model developed two deca d
es earlier by social scientists such as Robert Osgood and Thomas
Schelling I I Again military forces are not to fight but to signal,
not to engage in combat in order to defeat enemy forces, but to
deter area, says Waltz, is "not to develop a strategy that will
help enable us to fight'such a war. Instead, the problem is to
develop a strategy that will help us avoid having to do so.118
implicitly assumes that the Rapid Deployment Joint Task Force whose
mission has been described as providing a "trip wiretf a g ainst
Soviet design on the Persian oil fields, will not actually fight
If, in a crisis, we were to put our troops in the oil fields, it
would make the depth of our interest, the extent of our
determination, and the strength of our will manifest The assump t
ion is that, if Americans were placed in the path of the Soviets,
were they to covet the oil fields, they would not dare to confront
the United States. But war is guided by political objectives, and
were it in the interest of the Soviets to mo.ve against the oil
fields, what would stop them from doing so? war without engaging in
combat. Thus the problem in the Gulf Waltz Light infantry and
airbozne forces are not designed to stop a mechanized, armored
force intent on reaching its objective.

But the limited war theorist really hoes not expect a fight to
develop, or contemplate the consequences for the men of the Rapid
Deployment Force if it does. Robert Jervis repeats the limited war
assumption. With regard to conventional forces in Africa or Asia If
using l arge armies is] less important for influencing the cause of
battle than for showing the other side that things will get out of
hand.Ilg But as Stephen Rosen of the National Security Council
staff has observed e The old disregard for domestic political fac t
ors is im plicit in the arguments of both [Waltz and Jervis since
it is assumed that resolve is a fixed quantity, that it does not
grow or diminish in the minds of the public or the leadership as
combat goes well or poorly, as battles drag on or move us p e
rceptively toward success.1o What would happen to American resolve,
were the Soviets to dis regard U.S. lfsignalsll and roll over a
lightly armed element enroute to the oil fields For a catalogue of
this way of thinking, see Stephen Peter Rosen, "Vietnam and the
American Theory of Limited War," International Security, Fall 1982
Kenneth Waltz A Strategy for the Rapid Deployment Force,"
International Security, Spring 1981, pp. 57 64, and 67.

Robert Jervis Why Nuclear Superiority Doesn' t Matter Political
Sci ence Quarterly, Winter 79-80, pp. 618-619 lo Rosen, op. cit. 9
Clearly one purpose of the American military is to deter war, but
when it comes, U.S. units must be manned, equipped, and trained to
fight with the aim of defeating an enemy force in combat. T he
limited war theorists ignore or minimize the impor tance of the
latter.

Meyer recently pointed out in an address at the Army War College
the military faces a threefold task The strategic requirements of
the 1980s are to prepare for the 'Three Days of Wa r': to deter the
day before the war; to fight the day of the war; and to terminate
conflict in such a manner that on the day after the war, the United
States and its allies enjoy an acceptable level of security If But
as Army Chief of Staff General Edward THE CRUX OF REAL MILITARY
REFORM: THINKING ABOUT MILITARY FORCE The problem with military
reform is that most of its advocates have not addressed the central
issue of how and when military force is to be used In many cases,
they are still operating within the paradigm of the academic theory
of limited war worse, in the wake of Vietnam, they have abandoned
faith in the efficacy of military force altogether It is
significant, for instance, that those who have advocated the
replacement of the attrition/firepo w er style of warfare by the
maneuver style offer no strategic context within which that
operational or tactical style-is to be employed What does it mean
for American policy if any of the various proposals put forward by
the reformers are indeed adopted? T h e problem is that these
proposals are often at odds with political or strategic reality, or
seem to contradict the reformers own assumptions. For instance, the
adoption of a maneuver-oriented doctrine for the defense of Europe
does not accord with Germany ' s desire for security, since a
doctrine of maneuver warfare would require that German territory be
relinquished at the outset, and that German soil itself become the
whole battlefield. If the reformers reply that they advocate a
pullout of U.S. forces fro m NATO and the establishment of a U.S
maritime strategy does their criticism of a surface navy in general
and large carriers in particular make sense, given the requirement
to project naval power ashore in any strategy based on maritime
power? Such debates cannot be resolved until the
strategic"questions are addressed, until the means advocated by the
reformers are examined in the light of the purposes of war Even c
But even this obvious shortcoming, the failure to consider the
strategic implications of the ir own doctrinal reforms, does not
get to the crux of the matter. The fact is there will be no
effective reform unless there is a reevaluation of the question of
the use of military force.

Many who now are pushing for defense reforms fail to recognize
shar ed assumptions such as a disdain for strategic thinking; a
belief that wars cannot be won, because of the possible use oflo
nuclear weapons; and an emphasis on cost-effectiveness of some
sort. If this is the case and if these assumptions are false the
ref o rmers will have little real impact on the success of U.S
forces on the battlefield It is too often uncritically assumed in
the nuclear age, and in the wake of the American failure in
Vietnam, that military force is no longer useful. Those who would
even c o nsider employ ing military force are accused of seeking a
military solution instead of a political or diplomatic one. The
source of this uncritical rejection of military force is the same
as the theory of limited war: that the use of military force will a
lways threaten to escalate into general, i.e nuclear war, and that
there is no value worth preserving that can justify such a
risk.

The attitude is summed up in the famous aphorism of the late
Bernard Brodie Thus far, the chief purpose of our military
establishment has been to win wars. From now on, its chief purpose
must be to avert them."

This failure to appreciate the legitimate use of military force
under certain circumstances for the attainment of liberal goals
lies at the heart of America's military weakness. Without
redressing this defect, no military reform can be truly
possible.

There must be, therefore, a new recognition of the proper rela
tionship betQeen force and international politics, and of the
necessity of the military to the attainment of liberal'gdals
Military force is one of many instruments for pursuing the nation's
foreign policy goals. But it must be purposeful: The differences
between the use of force in Grenada and Lebanon are instructive As
Henry Kissinger has remarked, the basic d ecision regarding force
is whether or not to use it, not whether to fire the big gun or the
little gun. Force must be adequate to the task and employed
relentlessly, if employed at all, until success is achieved In the
words of Philip Gold, "There is no p rize for losing with
restraint; there is no reward for failing with modera tion.

APPROPRIATE USES OF FORCE Before true military reform can be
effected; a reevaluation of the utility of military force is
necessary tion must begin by demonstrating something that used to
be under stood by all U.S. statesmen: that force can be used for
good.

Force is an instrument, a means to an end. If the end is good
the proportionate use of force to achieve the end is legitimate And
that reevalua Furthermore, it must be understood what the rejection
of military force means for the hope of establishing a li b eral
world order. To reject the use of military force is to reject an
important tool of statecraft, and to provide an incentive for
adversaries of the U.S. to use the military option themselves
without fear of retaliation. This observation is reinforced b y 11
the fact that, since the end of World War 11, every retreat by-a
democratic nation for want of will to use military force has been
followed by the advance of a totalitarian nation. To achieve the
goals of a democratic foreign policy, the United States has no
choice but to participate fully in world affairs. Such participa
tion may at times require the employment of military force.

It is often asserted that the United States puts too much faith
in military solutions, as opposed to political ones. But al l
solutions in international affairs are political: the military
option is just one aspect, and indeed, may be required for the
success of other options. For instance, diplomacy often succeeds
only when an adversary knows that a nation is willing to to ba c k
up its claims by force if necessary. Diplomatic or economic options
may ultimately depend upon the credible use or threat of military
fo-rce. Thus in El Salvador, it may be necessary to defeat the
insurgents before an economic approach can bear fruit. I n Lebanon,
it may be necessary to use force to stop the fighting among
religious factions before it will be possible to establish the
conditions required for any sort of a stiible coalition govern-
ment.

The cost of U.S. involvement in world affairs must n ot blind
Americans to the act that military force of varying degrees
sometimes has great utility in helping achieve the goals of peace
and respect for human rights. It was Pascal who observed that force
without justice is brutal, but justice without force is impotent.
The point is to combine'justice and force.

The use of military force sometimes involves the violation of
international law, and those who criticize its use on these grounds
must be taken seriously But those who invoke this criticism must
ackn owledge that prudence sometimes dictates that the form of
international law must at times be sacrificed for the sake of that
which the law is intended to accomplish: the protec- tion of life
and liberty and the maintenance of a democratic world order. Cri
tics must recognize that in the end international law depends for
its continued existence on the strength of demo- cratic'nations,
such as the United States, and their demonstrated commitment to
support a world order dedicated to liberty and human rights.

CONCLUSION It may be regrettable, but wars'are sometimes
necessary to a nation's honor, if not its very survival. The U.S.
must acknow- ledge that world reality dictates that good can
sometimes come of military force, or there can be no hope for true
mili t ary reform Organizational or doctrinal changes may have
marginal impact on the operational or strategic capability of
American military forces, but the assumptions of the political
leadership concerning the use of military force are far more
fundamental. W ith all due 12 respect to those who unconditionally
reject the utility of military force, the conflicts raging at any
moment around the globe surely indicate that a nation would appear
to be at a severe disadvantage in this world of drawn swords, if it
we re denied the use of that force.

Prepared for The Heritage Foundation by Mackubin Thomas Owens,
Ph.D I C 9 c fcDr. Mackubin Thomas Owens is on the staff of a U.S.
Senator and is adjunct professor at the Marine Corps Command and
Staff College. He is the aut hor of the forthcoming book, The Best
Guardian of Liberty: Alexander Hamilton and the Creation of the
American Union. i c.